


Small Encounters

by signalbeam



Category: Persona 3, Persona 4
Genre: Character-centric, Gen, Hot Springs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-27
Updated: 2011-02-27
Packaged: 2017-10-18 00:53:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/183199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/signalbeam/pseuds/signalbeam
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yukiko picks up a strange idea from a member of Gekkoukan High's volleyball team.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Small Encounters

The three girls made their way to the front desk shoving each other and giggling all the way. Yukiko recognized them as the high schoolers from the city. The volleyball club—or was it the tennis club? She couldn’t remember. There had been a last minute change of plans. They were all, she recognized with a dull sort of curiosity, very attractive. And they certainly looked better than they had that afternoon, huffing and puffing as they jogged around the field of the high school.

The girl normally at the desk, Orie, was taking care of a fussy customer’s room service, and most of the other workers were either cleaning up or already retired for the night. Yukiko was the only person in the lobby. The girls whispered to each other, feigning argument and anger, and occasionally broke out into laughter. A girl with red hair caught Yukiko’s eye. The gaze lingered for a moment, then two. Yukiko shivered, as though she had been touched or as though their hands had brushed together by accident, then one of them lingered for far too long.

“Hey,” said the girl. Her smile was roguish, but her voice was sweeter than Yukiko expected. “Are you busy right now?”

“I think she’s doing homework, isn’t she?” said the girl with long black hair tied back into a ponytail. “You’re Yukiko Amagi-san, right? I’m Rio Iwasaki. We met earlier.”

“It’s a pleasure to be reacquainted,” Yukiko said. She shut her book and stood. “Is there something I can help you with, Iwasaki-san?”

Iwasaki looked to the other two girls. They seemed to take one step closer to breaking out into laughter, collectively. “My friends and I were wondering if you could help us solve something.”

This didn’t sound like a very serious request. Nothing like ‘a fan hit and cracked someone’s skull open,’ at least. “Of course,” she said.

“A ghost,” said the tan girl. Her face was set into a look of grim courage. “Is there a ghost at the Inn?”

“Yuko, that wasn’t the question!”

“I’m sorry! I get a little freaked out by stuff like that!”

“Actually,” said the red-eyed girl, “we wanted to know if the hot springs are still open.” Rio and Yuko stopped squabbling. This must be their leader. She had a good effect on people.

“They’re open until ten, I think,” Yukiko said. “You’ll have to wait another fifteen minutes until they’re open to women again, but after that you’ll have the hot springs to yourself until closing time.”

“You’re going in for another dip?” Rio said.

“Yeah. You guys coming with me?”

“Can’t,” said Yuko. “Kaz will be wondering where I am. That big baby… I can’t believe he tried to cling to me while we were telling those stories.”

“Who was clinging onto who?” Rio said.

“Hey!”

“So I’ll be going by myself, then,” said red. She flashed Yukiko a smile, so quick and discreet that Yukiko wasn’t sure it had happened. “Thanks, Amagi-san.”

“The pleasure was mine,” Yukiko said, bowing her head. The three girls head back to their room, still chatting with one another. The red-eyed girl winked at Yukiko before she left, this one unmistakable. It felt almost like… an invitation. Yukiko opened her textbook, but couldn’t focus her eyes on the page.

 

*

 

Orie returned twenty minutes later. Yukiko excused herself from the desk. She told Orie that she’d catch a bath before heading home. That was what she said aloud. What she didn’t say aloud was that there was something about the girl that made her stand up and made her pulse quicken. But she wasn’t going to take a bath because of that. No.

The changing room was empty. Yukiko changed out of her clothes, folded them into a box, and wrapped herself in a towel. The steam from the springs were thicker than usual. She could barely see a thing. It was almost as though there was a fog blanketing everything. But she saw the red-haired girl there well enough. She was relaxing in the waters, arms spread out on the rocks. She looked comfortable, relaxed, almost as though she might drift off to sleep at any moment.

“Hey, is that you?” said the girl.

“Y-yes,” she said. “May I come in?” She blushed at that, though no one could see her. Why ask for permission? The springs were open and she was going to own them someday.

There was a little silence. Then: “Come on in, then.”

She did. The rocks were slippery beneath her feet. She was afraid of falling—but more than that, she was afraid of falling and making a fool out of herself. When she reached the water’s edge, she slipped into the water, one inch at a time. It was different coming here alone with a stranger, though the girl didn’t seem like a stranger. But she didn’t seem like she was a friend, either.

The girl padded over to Yukiko. Yukiko, nearly by instinct, took half a step back.

“I’m Minako Arisato,” she said. “From Gekkoukan High in Iwatodai. So you own the place?”

“N-no,” Yukiko said. “It’s my family’s. I’m helping out, that’s all.”

“I see,” said Arisato, drifting back to her original spot in the baths. “Planning on heading out of town someday, then?”

“No, not at all,” she said.

“Never?”

“Maybe someday,” Yukiko said. “But only on a trip or on vacation. I’d never leave Inaba.”

The mist obscured Arisato’s face, made it hard to see; to perceive. Yukiko heard a soft ‘plop,’ then Arisato’s head dropping into the water. Arisato reappeared a second later, closer than before.

“Devoted to the business, then!” Arisato said. She was too enthusiastic to sound sympathetic. Yukiko eased into the water a little further.

“Well,” said Yukiko. “Yes…?”

“It’s a nice trait,” Arisato said. “Very admirable. I know someone like that.”

“There are all kinds of people in the city,” said Yukiko. Her face felt hot. Everything above the surface of the water felt hot. And everything below—she shivered again, not knowing why. Arisato stepped in again. This time Yukiko didn’t step back. “All kinds of people.”

“Haha.” Arisato winked. “I like that about places with a lot of people. Makes you strong.”

So what, did that mean that Arisato thought that Yukiko was weak? Yukiko felt a little prickle of indignation creep across her chest. Well, she wasn’t. She was just fine here in Inaba, with the rice fields, in her hound’s-tooth uniform, in her drafty house and long hours of isolation, counting the number of cars that drove through the shopping district on a Sunday afternoon on one hand.

“Actually,” said Arisato, and Yukiko felt dizzy, nearly, overcome with something, anything. “Actually,” Arisato said, this time sounding apologetic. “I think a friend might have followed me from home. You wouldn’t have happened to seen a strange looking girl anywhere around here? Blonde hair, blue eyes, a little—a little strange, I guess.”

“No, there’s no one like that around here,” said Yukiko. There was Kanji, but Kanji couldn’t be mistaken for a girl in any respect. Her heart was pounding. She felt as though she had escaped something, just barely, just nearly, so closely as to make her sweat. City people were strange, she thought, in more ways than one.

“Oh, good,” Arisato said. “I was a little worried, after I saw the…” She reclined against the rocks, letting out a long exhale. After she had seen the, after she saw the… Yukiko felt a tingle of something. Couldn’t help it, couldn’t stop it—she felt, so badly, as though she was on the edge of something, the very pinnacle of it, as though she was already spinning wildly off balance and all it’d take was a few more seconds and she’d fall, irreparably, to the ground and crack. “But just in case she’s here! I won’t be mad if you’re out there!”

“Um, the area is fenced,” said Yukiko. “I don’t think anyone can get in.”

“People really are capable of a lot more than you think,” Arisato said. For most people it would have been an off-handed remark, but Arisato meant it, completely and sincerely.

Capable of so much, even being able to leave Inaba, even as much as being able to drop off the face of the earth—she was filled with a sudden vision, one that rose up within her with the force of the tides jumping up the beach. If some strange person was able to enter Inaba, then surely she’d be able to leave—surely she’d be able to go.

“Should I alert security?” Yukiko said.

“No, don’t trouble yourself,” Arisato said. “She would have shown up by now.”

“Because if she’s a danger—”

“Only to Shadows,” Arisato said. She rested her head against the rocks. “She’s harmless to most people.”

The waters had ceased to be warm for Yukiko. Still, she felt as though she couldn’t leave without asking Arisato something, without pushing something. Perhaps she’d ask for Arisato’s number or e-mail, so she could contact Arisato later—but what for? ‘Remember me? I’ve run away from home.’ It’d make no sense. She had no reason to go. This idea had been planted in her from the outside. If these city people had never come, then she wouldn’t be here now. It was a spiteful thought, but one easy to grab a hold of, and once she had it, she let herself be taken away by it. She had to get out of here. She had to go home. She was late enough as it was. Her parents would start to worry. And how much they would worry if she left entirely—

“If you say so,” Yukiko said. “If you’ll excuse me, Arisato-san. It’s getting late.”

“Sleep tight,” Arisato said. “I’ll be here until the hour’s up, I think.”

“Okay.” Yukiko pressed the heavy, soaked towel against her body to keep it in place as she returned to the lockers. She had gotten her hair wet. She shouldn’t have; she hated having wet hair. It’d bother her all the way back home.

She must have looked like such a simple country girl in front of Arisato, easily flustered and with a haircut that looked so dull and unimpressive. Perhaps she ought to get it cut or dyed, or maybe shave it all off, or shave something strange into the side of her head—it struck her as funny, but not very. She felt better now that she was away from Arisato. It had been the heat, she rationalized. It was hot outside and stepping into a hot spring hadn’t been the best way to deal with that heat. And Arisato had been so—strange? Yes. The wanderlust had been a result of the temperature.

Reassured, Yukiko dried herself off and dressed. She was not jealous, she was not envious. There was nothing that Arisato and her friends had that Yukiko wanted or desired. She had a home, she had a family, and she had a friend. She tucked a strand of wet hair behind her ear, and was not surprised when it fell back over into her face, sticking to her cheek like a black mask. She imagined herself back in the springs, looking into Arisato’s eyes. _Take me with you!_ , she would have said. She giggled to herself, nervously, because she had meant it to be a joke, yet it resonated in her, the way a bell did when struck. The vibrations shook through every inch of her, so there was no doubt in her what she had done; what she had wanted.


End file.
